The Wyoming Black Fourteen (1969)

The Wyoming Black Fourteen were African American members of the 1969 University of Wyoming (UW) football team who protested playing a game with Brigham Young University (BYU) because of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’s ban on black males holding the priesthood in the church and other racial restrictions. The priesthood ban applied exclusively to men of African descent.

The 14 players, Jerry Berry, Tony Gibson, John Griffin, Lionel Grimes, Mel Hamilton, Ron Hill, Willie Hysaw, Jim Isaac, Earl Lee, Don Meadows, Tony McGee, Ivie Moore, Joe Williams, and Ted Williams, were part of a successful Wyoming football team. Under Head Coach Lloyd Eaton, the Wyoming Cowboys had won three consecutive Western Athletic Conference (WAC) championships and in 1969 it was considered the best football team to ever play for the University.

The protest began on October 15, 1969 when Willie Black, a 32-year-old math graduate student and head of Wyoming’s Black Student Alliance, upon learning of the LDS ban on black male priests, brought a letter titled “We Must Protest,” to University administrators. The letter described the race issues of the Mormon church, including the priesthood restriction and other prohibitions such as barring all women and men of African ancestry from participation in temple rituals. Black’s letter called for all Wyoming football players and students to protest LDS church policies during the scheduled game with BYU, three days later on October 18.

Two days before the game, the 14 black players walked to the athletic complex to discuss options for how they might protest. They eventually decided to wear black armbands but nonetheless compete in the game. On October 17, the day before the game, Coach Eaton upon hearing about their decision, ordered the players to the bleachers where he reprimanded them, and then released them from the team, revoking their athletic scholarships. The University announced that the Board of Trustees supported Coach Eaton’s decision and said “the players will not play in today’s game or any [other] during the balance of the season.” The Cowboys, now an all-white team, went on to beat BYU 40-7 and won two more games but lost four of the remaining games in the season.

The dismissal of the 14 brought swift, unwanted local and national attention to the University. First, the UW Student Senate passed a resolution which said in part, “The actions of coach Eaton and the Board of Trustees were not only uncompromising, but unjust and totally wrong.” By the end of October, the UW College of Arts and Sciences, the largest college on campus voted to support the student athletes. The major networks, ABC, CBS, and NBC all covered the story as did Sports Illustrated.

In response to the Black Fourteen being expelled from the team, a number of athletes of all races wore black armbands in support including the entire San Jose (California) State Team that lost to the Cowboys in their last season game. The protest of the Fourteen would eventually spark nationwide focus on LDS church practices and other protests by student athletes. Students at the campuses of almost every BYU opponent protested at the games regardless of the sport and called on their institutions to ban contests with BYU athletic teams. Stanford University President Kenneth Pitzer announced that his institution would no longer participate in athletic contests against Brigham Young University and the University of Washington Faculty Senate voted to sever all ties with BYU athletics.

Despite their dismissal, several of the 14 received college degrees from Wyoming and other institutions. Jerry Berry, one of the 14, became a sports anchor for TV stations in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Chicago, Illinois, and Detroit, Michigan. In 2002, a statue to the 14 was erected in the Student Union on the University of Wyoming campus. In 2009, the 40th anniversary of the Black 14, the LDS Institute at the University of Wyoming made black arm bands in tribute to the events of 1969 and handed them out to all in attendance.

BlackPast.org is an independent non-profit corporation 501(c)(3). It has no affiliation with the University of Washington. BlackPast.org is supported in part by a grant from Humanities Washington, a state-wide non-profit organization supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the state of Washington, and contributions from individuals and foundations.